Dominic Thiem has sent out a warning to the rest of the draw at the US Open after producing a comprehensive win over Next Gen star Felix Auger-Aliassime in the fourth round.
The second seed thwarted an early threat posed by the world No.21 as he eased to a 7-6(5), 6-1, 6-1, victory to reach his second New York quarter-final in three years. In what was a battle of fitness, the lesser experienced Auger-Aliassime struggled to conjure up a way to tame Thiem’s game as he produced a costly 51 unforced errors. Enabling the world No.3 to break six times overall.
“I was really nervous before the match. I know that I was going to be playing against an amazing opponent,” Thiem revealed following his latest win.
“I had a chance to serve for the first set and missed it pretty poorly. Then in the tiebreak I started to miss less and less. In set two and three were 100 per cent my best sets so far in this tournament.’
“I’m really happy with this one because I’ve just beaten an amazing opponent and upcoming superstar.”
With a place in the last eight and the added bonus of title favourite Novak Djokovic exiting the tournament on Sunday, the showdown was as much about nerves as it was about physical fitness. In what was their first ever encounter, three-time major finalist Thiem was pushed to his limits during the opener by the 20-year-old. Auger-Aliassime had only dropped serve once in his three previous matches, but came undone midway through the first set after a forehand error gifted Thiem the break as he nudged ahead 4-2. Then it was the Austrian’s turn to falter after producing a series of errors whilst serving with a 5-4 advantage. Despite the blip, Thiem regained control in the tiebreak with the help of a blistering backhand winner to seal a mini-break before making a successful challenge to one of his opponents shots to reward him the 7-6 lead.
After coming through a stern test, Thiem then dominated proceedings with a clinical performance against his rapidly tiring rival on the Arthur Ashe Arena. Overall he dropped just six points behind serve during the second set as he capitalised from Auger-Aliassime’s rapidly increasing error count.
Surging in confidence on court, 27-year-old Thiem encountered little trouble sealing his 288th win on the Tour as a professional player. He converted his first match point opportunity with the help of a breathtaking backhand winner down the line.
“I started to have a great feeling in sets two sand three. I started to find the mixture again which I last had in Australia (at the Australian Open). A perfect mixture from offence to defence and not missing a lot. Putting a lot of returns back into play and it was one of my best matches so far,” he commented on his performance.
The 27-year-old is the highest ranked player left in the draw following the disqualification of Djokovic. Meaning that there will be a first-time Grand Slam winner in New York with no members of the Big Three featuring in the semi-finals for the first time since 2004.
“I focus only on myself and try to look from match-to-match. In the end, for myself and for the other remaining players in the draw it doesn’t matter at all if the big three are still in or not,” Thiem stated.
“I think everybody just wants their hands on the trophy. It doesn’t matter who they have to beat.”
Thiem will play Australia’s Alex de Minaur for a place in the semi-finals at the New York major on Wednesday. De Minaur eased to a straight-sets win over Vasek Pospisil earlier in the day to reach the last eight of a major for the first time in his career.
“It’s just going to be a match where I’m just going to have to try to stand my ground again, do what I do best, stay solid, and look for any kind of opportunity I can to dictate,” De Minaur previewed.
In their head-to-head, Thiem leads De Minaur 2-0 but hasn’t played him since 2018.
